They Gave Me My Name but It Does Not Define Me
by eggsaladstain
Summary: This is a story of fathers and sons, of the legacies they leave, of the futures they weave, of the chains that bind them, and how to break them.


The men of the Jones clan all share the same name, and in any other family, this might be a sign of reverence, of respect for their elders, but not in this one. It is a reminder, one that has been passed down through the generations, that your name is not your own and neither is your future, that your life is not a gift but a debt, and one that must be paid.

You cannot escape us.

We made you.

We control you.

We own you.

…

Forsythe the eldest, the first of his name, was, according to legend, a real man's man. He built his house with his own two hands, and most of the furniture too, and made a living from nothing more than the sweat on his brow and the strength of his character. He was honest and kind, a good husband and a loving father, and his descendants would have been happy to carry his name through the pages of history.

What legend doesn't tell you is that he was also a con man – a swindler and occasionally, a thief. As it turns out, you can't make a living on your character alone, and so Forsythe the First turned to less legal ways to support himself and his young family, but even then, it was barely enough to put food on the table. The kindness he was so known for soon turned brittle in his veins, and the lines on his face were sharp like scars.

He took to the bottle frequently, more often than not, and on his best days he broke dishes and bruised his hands.

At his worst, he wasn't the only one who bruised.

His son received the brunt of it, because that's what Jones men do, they absorb hate and anger and pain, before they're even really men, before they can learn otherwise, before they ever have a chance to know anything else.

Forsythe Pendleton Jones I was a real man's man who was honest and lied, who was cruel and kind, who was not always good, but always tried.

He gave his son his own name in the hopes that he would achieve with it the success that he himself never found.

But all he saw was just another face with the same name for him to hate.

…

Forsythe the elder, the second of his name, is, if you listen to the whispers, a real piece of work. A self-proclaimed shitbag and all-around asshole, he spent his childhood resentful – of his father for his dead-end, minimum-wage job, of his mother for being too weak to leave, of his friend Fred, who had a nice family and a nice house and a nice dog.

Forsythe the Second always wanted a dog. It was the only thing he ever asked for on every wish list, for every birthday and every Christmas, and it was the one thing he never got. His mother explained that they just couldn't afford another mouth to feed, that pets were expensive and time-consuming, but so were all the bottles of whiskey his father drank and all the trips to the clinic afterwards. She never did have a good response to that.

Eventually, he stopped asking. He grew out of it and he grew up, and he learned to dream bigger, dreams of leaving this backwater town, of making a fresh start in a new place where no one knew his family or his history, where no one knew his name.

He would've done it too. He would've left and never looked back if it hadn't been for that wild party out by the lake where he drank a little too much and smoked a little something he shouldn't have, where he fooled around with the first girl he saw, and a couple weeks later, found out that his hookup was now knocked up.

When his parents found out, his father yelled at him like he had never done before, called him a dumbass, said that he threw his future down the drain, and chucked an empty beer can at his head before storming out of the house. But his mother, she just cried. And somehow, that was worse.

The girl's family was religious, so an abortion was out of the question, and when he suggested adoption, they just looked at him like he was crazy. _God works in mysterious ways_ , they had said, but he was pretty sure it wasn't God who had been too impatient to find a condom that night.

Eventually, they worked out an agreement for child support and minimal visitation rights. He hadn't really wanted anything to do with the baby, but her parents believed strongly in traditional family values, and since he wasn't willing to marry their daughter, this was the least he could do.

So he got a dead-end, minimum wage job of his own, assembled a crib, and waited.

Nine months later, his son was born. And Forsythe the Second gave him his own name, his old man's name, in the hopes that he would always remember who he was and where he came from, in the hopes that he would make him a better man. And when he looked upon that small, scrunched face, he really thought it might be true.

He eventually did marry that girl, in a small church, just the two of them and their witnesses – their son, their new baby girl, and the babysitter. They moved into a cozy house that he renovated himself, with a nursery he painted, put their daughter in the crib that once belonged to her brother, and for a while, they were happy. They went to work and to school, and on Saturday nights, as a special treat, they went to Pop's for dinner and then the drive-in after. On Sundays, they slept in and had waffles in bed.

Their lives were quiet and simple. They were a family. It was enough.

Until one day, it wasn't.

Like his father before him, he found that money was tight, that there were always more bills to pay, more food to buy. He worked longer hours, leaving the house before his family woke and returning long after they fell asleep. He was hungry most of the time, and irritable too, but to his credit, he never once turned to liquor. It was one of the few good things he ever did in his life.

At some point, the men he ran with began calling themselves a gang, and the people in town grew wary whenever they approached. And it wasn't the kind of power he wanted, but it was power all the same, so he embraced it, chased it, and gave them a name.

One night, after a long day knocking heads and knocking down doors, he came home to find his son sitting alone in the kitchen, the table set for two. There was a note in his hand, and the boy held it so tightly that the paper tore when he took it from him.

 _Left with Jellybean.  
_ _Dinner in the oven.  
_ _Don't look for us._

The breath left his chest then, and never quite came back.

Many years later, when his now teenaged son moves out, he asks him why he didn't leave with his mother and sister when he had the chance.

 _Because this was home_ , Forsythe the Third says, before walking out the door, all his worldly possessions shoved into the bag over his shoulder.

That's the last time he ever sees his son under his roof again.

This was home. But not anymore. Now, it's just an empty house, filled with regret.

Forsythe Pendleton Jones II is a real piece of work, who endured abuse and prevailed, who had a daughter and a wife who bailed, who tried to be a good father, and failed.

…

The youngest male of the Jones clan, the third of his name, may be lacking in years but not in his experiences. He feels the weight of his grandfather's bitterness, his father's resentment, his mother's loneliness, his sister's innocence. He feels all these things so keenly that some days, he feels nothing at all.

Growing up, his father always called him a dreamer, a thinker – _that's my son, got a brain on him, isn't he smart?_ But as he got older, it became apparent that Riverdale is no place for dreamers, no, Riverdale is for doers, for workers, for people who take orders, and suddenly, his father started singing a different tune – _yeah, that's my son, head's always in the clouds, don't know what I'm gonna do with him._

It was like the flip of a switch, the day his father stopped praising his potential and started seeing him as a disappointment.

So he tried to be better. He tried to be tough, to be obedient, to be the son his father wanted him to be. And he saw himself, twenty years from now, bitter and cruel, with his own son, a never-ending chain of lives half-lived, a never-changing cycle of regret.

This is what the future holds for him, but it is not the life he wants. And unlike his father, and his father before him, he decides to change it.

As soon as he is old enough to work, he takes a job at the drive-in just to get out of the house. The pay is shit and it makes his eyes hurt, but it feels like family, like happier days before his mother and sister left. It feels like freedom.

He starts writing about anything and everything – the way the trees look in the fall, the way the neon sign outside Pop's glows in the night, the way this town has a life and a heartbeat of its own. He writes the truth in everything he sees because it's the truth that is at the core of the Jones family legacy, or rather, the denial of it.

His grandfather could never admit that he was a washed-up crook who beat his own son, and he drank himself to death to forget it.

His father could never accept his failings towards his family and spends every night in a lonely house, waiting for a wife, daughter, and son who will never return.

He is not like them. He will never follow in their footsteps. Their mistakes are not his, nor are their lives. Their sins will not become his own.

His name is Forsythe Pendleton Jones III, and he is a brilliant boy trapped in a town too small, who, despite his circumstances, still stands tall, who seeks the truth and freedom most of all.

A young man who is haunted by ghosts, who misses his sister and keeps her photo close, who wasn't quite loved enough, but almost.

He is Forsythe Pendleton Jones, and he is the third of his name.

He is Jughead, and he is the first.

…

The men of the Jones clan all share the same name.

All except one.

…

 _Fin_


End file.
